DAY ONE FOR SHILOH

Jan 30

            Day one for Shiloh to be introduced to lunging. Unlike Sam, he had no problem going forward. In fact he was a bit explosive going forward at first. For some reason, Shiloh is over reactive to any kind of touching or movement towards his hind end. He is the one that is hard to touch his back legs and I finally had to use a soft cotton rope around his legs to pick them up and not be leaned on or flinched away from. Eventually I did get him to let me hold his hind legs up, but only for a moment or two. I will keep working on this.

            Likewise, he was overly reactive to the touch of the whip on his hip. Shiloh( and Bleu, for that matter) had never had the mannering halter (I found out that is the official name for the ring) on, so he was surprised when he couldn’t just take off away from me and I could still hold him. He did settle into the lunge program pretty fast, however, and I was able to get him out on a 20 meter circle almost at once. These Icelandics are very intelligent and learn quickly. Good for me, not good for someone who is less experienced in getting what they want from a green horse. I only went to the left, because I feel if is a mistake to throw too much at a horse the first time they learn a new exercise. He still acts like he is insulted that I should ask him to do anything not his idea, but by the time we were done, after about 20 minutes, he was stopping when I asked him to and walking and trotting pretty well. He is also a pretty good mover, but not as nice as Sam.

            Today was Sam’s fifth day of work and I put the surcingle on him. He didn’t bat an eye at it and work as if it wasn’t there. We’ll see if that was just not knowing and that it really doesn’t bother him or if he will act out on the next session. In another couple of sessions, I will put a crupper on it and see what he does then. He went right to work without a fuss and I find that he is easier to catch now that we have more of a working relationship. I really like this fellow.

DAY THREE, WHAT A GOOD BOY

Jan 27

            This is day three for Sam working on the lunge line. He really rose to the occasion. He is proving to uphold the reputation of the Icelandic Horse for being intelligent and good tempered. Today, Sam walked right out when asked and went in both directions on a 20 meter circle without acting out. He still challenged the ring halter, but not seriously. I was able to ask him to trot with the word and a few clicks and he halted more readily than before. He is a very cute mover and was relaxed and seemed to give in to what I was asking him to do.

            Before I take Sam out to lunge him, I groom him and pick his feet. I am able to pick the front feet with no trouble, but I am only able to pick up his back feet and have him stand up on his other three feet right now. He is one that the ferrier was able to trim, but I am not as brave as he is and want this pony to pick his feet up and not feel like he is going to step all over my head doing it. Today he let me hold the back feet up and put them down when I let him. Big step for Sam.

            I will give him a day off tomorrow and then lunge him again the day after that. Next week I will pick another Icy to start on the lunge and Sam will move on to another exercise. Hopefully(at least this is the plan) I will be able to start another Icy each week and they will progress in that order. However, as everyone knows, not all people or animals progress at the same rate. I’ll just have to see who does what and how fast.

            I am encouraged by Sam’s quick grasp of this exercise.

            Shiloh scooted out the gate when I was putting Bleu in the round pen with him. Such a stinker! He went to the nearest grass and started eating, luckily, but wouldn’t let me catch him until I had him cornered in the garden. I’ll have to watch this fellow. He has too many wheels turning in his head. I may choose him to be the next lunging candidate. 

DAY TWO FOR SAM

Jan 26

Day two of Sam’s work. He was very good to the left, the only direction we did yesterday. I didn’t have to touch him with the whip to get him to move, he did it on his own. He walked out and continued to walk on a 15 meter circle without a problem. I did some walk/halt transitions until he seemed to get the hang of that and then asked him to trot. He tried to pull out of the circle a couple of times, but all in all he was very good considering he is clueless as to what is expected of him.

             When he seemed to be pretty settled in his work to the left (about 10 minutes) I turned him to the right. As with all horses, he wanted to go in the direction that he was comfortable with, however, it didn’t take as much convincing to get him to go to the right on the circle. Once he figured out what was expected of him, he was pretty willing for a while.

            Now, I have learned over the years that horses usually learn and resist in sets of three. What I mean by this is that usually if I repeat an exercise for three days, most horses have it figured out and do it with minimum evasion. In keeping with this theory, a horse will usually resist a new exercise three times before he accepts it and the new learned behavior. The exception to this rule is the horse who has been worked and handled so inconsistent that he keeps trying to get his way because he has in the past. These horses take longer to convince that there isn’t an alternative to doing what is asked of them, regardless of how many times they resist. Horses like this have been trained by poor methods to refuse to work.

            Getting back to my theory of three, number one is the resistance of not knowing. As you put the horse into the new exercise, he must learn what it is and sometimes that takes some patient repetition until they get it. With Sam I just had to keep giving him a go forward  stimulus and a place to go, which was to the left originally and then to the right the next day. Once he did it for a while and was praised for his efforts, he will try the number two resistance which is to say “I did this for you and now I don’t want to anymore.” Understandable from the horse’s point of view because he hasn’t given over his decision making to me yet. Once I work through this little trial, he will do what I want pretty well for a while. He is not trained to do the exercise yet, however. Number three resistance is the one where he pulls out all the stops and tries he best evasions. Some he has tried before and sometimes there is a new, more forceful one. You must work through this time and not end until it is finished. Once that has been accomplished and he is doing what is asked, then he has given you his decision power. Each time you work him at that exercise, he will be less resistant and more submissive to your will. He is on his way to being trained to do what you asked him to do.

            The important thing to remember is that just because he seems to catch on to what you want after a few minutes of a training session, that doesn’t mean he is trained to do what you just asked. At least not in the beginning. It takes time to convince a horse to give over his life to you and follow your every command. As the rider/driver of a horse, you take on the responsibility of making smart, safe and reasonable demands. 

Jan 25

            I’m putting up some pictures that my friend, Wanda Lusk, took when she came to stay with me last weekend. She came down to compete at our local Arena Driving Trial and while she was here she took some pictures of the Icys at liberty. We stood in the middle of the arena and laughed at the antics of the Icy Hoard as they chased and squabbled around us. They are entertaining at any time they are turned loose.

             I’ve mentioned how they play fight and that their idea of play is quite rough. The first picture is an indication of how energetic they are.  This is Trick and Bleu.

           Trick and Treat spend a lot of time moving around next to each other. This is a preview of what they will look like as the wheelers of my 4-in-hand.

           Trick, Treat and Bleu huffing and puffing after running like maniacs around the arena. 

         Trick and Bleu doing the Icys second favorite activity...eating.

SAM TAKES A BIG STEP

Jan 25

            I started Sam today to learn how to lunge. It looked like the wheels were turning as he looked at me like I was an idiot. They have always faced me, which is a common position for a wild horse to take. By facing anything that is strange or possibly dangerous, it can’t sneak up on them and get them. To get him to move on, I needed to use the lunge whip and tap him on the hip to get him to move. I am not using a bridle with a bit. That would be too harsh at this time. I know they are going to try to pull away from me and I don’t want them to pull on their mouths during those episodes. I will start to bit them up in the stalls so they can get used to the bit, but for this I used the be nice halter ( I’m not sure that is what it is called. It is actually a stainless steel oval with a whole at one end. At one time it was called a stud ring, but I use it upside down so the lunge line is on top of the nose. It works like a bosel.)

            Once I convinced Sam to move on when I gave the “Walk On” command, he tried to pull away, but this ring gives me enough strength to keep him from pulling away from me. I don’t have to do anything except hold it . He tried it about six or seven times and threw in rear for good measure and then seemed to accept what I was asking him. I worked with him about 20 minutes in the left direction only. It is tempting to try to do too much at first. The goal for today was to get Sam to move on from the command and keep going until I told him to “Whoa” Surprisingly, he figured it out pretty quickly. I have had horses that were supposedly trained to lunge do much worse. There are several evasions that every horse tries and he tried them as well, however, because he doesn’t have a history of success with them, once I stopped each one he gave it up. That doesn’t mean he won’t try them again later, but for now he doesn’t think they work.

            In the end, Sam walked when I told him to and stayed at a walk around a 15 meter circle twice. When I asked him to stop, he did it without too much repeating. I was pumped! He is the oldest and I hope to get him started first.

            When we were done, I walked him back into the barn, put him in the crossties and gave him his cookies. He was calm and went back to eating breakfast when I turned him loose in his stall. That is the goal when training. He will now think about what we did and tomorrow he should do it with less confusion(I hope).

Bleu

 Before

                                                                                                                  

 After

Sam

 Before

 After

     

 Shiloh

 Before

 After

 Treat

 Before

 After

 Trick

 Before

 After 

BY THE HAIR OF THEIR CHINNY CHIN CHINS

Jan 23

            The remaining three Icys have lost their whiskers. Everyone was very good. Shiloh was very calm through the whole process and Trick and Treat were troopers. I was able to get the clippers up behind Shiloh’s ears and he wasn’t very worried, but Trick and Treat aren’t quite ready for that yet. All of them tried to eat the clippers and stood quiet for me to clip their faces and to rub it up and down their necks. Because of  the thickness and dampness of the hair on the kids, it was slow going. By the time I finished with them, they were pretty bored with the whole process. I’m very proud of them and have taken some ‘before’ and ‘after’ pictures of their faces. The cool thing is that they have very cute faces. They look less chunky than they did. I love to rub them all over their foreheads and faces and they seem to like it as well.

            Bleu continues to move better. He is trotting most of the time now instead of tolting all the time. His canter has improved and he seems to be much more animated in general. It’s harder to tell him and Shiloh apart now. 

HAIR, HAIR, LONG FLOWING HAIR...

Jan 22

            Another Icy has his face trimmed. This time it is Bleu that has the new do. He is the one that had the longest face hairs and such thick coat. He was pretty good considering that he hasn’t ever had anything that buzzed and vibrated close to him as far as I know. At first I just put my hand against his face so the vibration was dampened some. He didn’t like it around his muzzle or lips. There are still long hairs there, but he didn’t mind it along his jaw or touching his neck. I trimmed the long hair along his throat as much as I could considering all the hair was wet. The Icys had been out in the arena together and are always wicking off heat from playing so much. Also it was above 50 degrees today.

            Once I started getting through the longer guard hairs his chin appeared. What a revelation. Until then, his head looked like a triangle with no definition. Now he looks like a different horse. There was a bit of a disagreement when I went from the near side (left) of him to the off side (right) of him, but we worked it out in pretty short order. I put the clippers up behind his ears, but didn’t try to clip his bridle path. I’ll do that with scissors. The hair is just too thick  and dirty for my small clipper blades.

            When I put him back in his stall, he decided to pout and pull his head away from me when I asked him to bring his nose towards me. We had to work on that a little until he gave in, but once he did there was no more attitude

            I’ll try to do another one tomorrow. Sam and Bleu were the ones I thought would be the easiest because of their temperaments, but you can never tell until you present the challenge to them. 

THE WORK PAYS OFF

Jan 18

            Everyone is getting much better with letting me pick up their back feet (except for you know who…Shiloh) I can pick up everyone’s tail except his as well. I’ve been putting my arms around each of them and even Shiloh lets me do that. The big news, though, is that I clipped Sam’s face today with the electric clippers. I was pleasantly surprised at how calm he accepted the noisy thing. I do have a set that have a high and low setting and I usually start most first time horses with the quieter low setting, but I was able to switch to the faster speed and didn’t have any more reactions from him than the slower one. I was able to take all of the long whiskers off of his nose and the long “goat” hairs under his jaw. He wasn’t ready for me to do his bridle path, although he did let me put the clippers up behind his ears without much problem. The Icy’s manes are so thick that I will be hard pressed to use my small clippers(A-5 Oster) on them. The task was made worse by the fact that when it is raining and kind of warm their hair is wet. He looks very cute, though, and I was terribly proud of him. I’m encouraged and will start doing one Icy a day until I have them all clipped.

            I use the clippers on new horses that come in for training as an ice breaker to get them to trust me in an activity that is inherently scary. Some horses don’t have any trouble with it, but some need to discover that I can do something scary to them that doesn’t hurt and as long as I say it is okay, it is okay. This is part of establishing that I make the decisions and am the leader. Before you can train any horse, you must establish that you make all of the decisions when you are near them. Eventually, they will follow directions without question. That is what we really want them to do. We don’t actually teach them to walk, trot and canter or turn or stop or go. They know how to do all of that within an hour of birth. What we want them to do and what we need to teach them is to do it when we want them to.

            The first thing that I always have to do with any horse that comes to me is establish the pecking order. There is only one head mare in my barn and that is me. By establishing that, all the rest is just repetition to teach them the cues and balance in what I ask them to do. All horses want to be with the alpha horse. The leader makes all of the important decisions. Once they have established themselves as the leader, they rarely have  to do it again unless a new horse comes into the group. I must always make sure that a horse knows without a doubt that I am the leader. Part of it is my manner around them, part of it is making them back off if they challenge me and part of it is never putting them in a position to question my authority. That means that 100% of the time I must be aware of what the horses are doing when I am around them. We like our equine friends to be chummy with us, but they play much harder than we do and they are a lot bigger. Discipline is one of the most important tools that we use and many people just don’t know how or when to use it.

            Like I said, I am very happy with Sam today and I expect the others to follow suit, even Shiloh. 

AND THE BEAT GOES ON

Jan 12

            This is probably the slowest time for training any horse. Although the Icys have been getting better all the time, I am cautious not to expect them to be really tamed in just two months. They have a façade of trained, but things can set them off. What I am trying to do is get them to give over their own decision making(run away, back away from people, ignore people…) to wanting to interact with me. So far, two have made that move, Bleu and Sam. Treat is making some headway in that direction, with Shiloh not too far behind although he still has some trust issues about being handled all over. Treat is still acting very cautious about being approached. He has gotten better, but he still turns away when I am catching the Icys up to put them away. Bleu and Sam are actually coming to me. Treat stands his ground and Shiloh goes to his stall door and waits for me.

            I have been working at touching their tails and moving them up and down. Again, Bleu and Sam are unconcerned. Treat is a little worried, but has gotten much better in the past few days. Trick still tucks his a bit, although he will let me move it. Shiloh is the least receptive to this and still won’t let me move his tail without goosing forward.

            Another activity I am doing is leaning across each Icy’s back and putting my arms around their girth area. Bleu doesn’t mind, Trick doesn’t seem to be too worried, Sam even allows me to squeeze him a little, Treat tried to grab at my arm, but is just looking at me now when I do it and still slow on the uptake is Shiloh. 

            The time I take getting the Icys used to all these moves and invasions into their personal space will pay off later when I will be adding equipment to the equation.

            Jill told me she picked up Treat’s hind feet yesterday. I’ve been working on him allowing me to touch him on his back legs so he doesn’t move them away. This was a good move for her to accomplish.

            The fun thing about all of the guys is that they have become pretty affectionate in their stalls. They let me rub their faces and ears. I can move all around them. I am starting to move them around in the stalls by pushing on their faces (originally they would push back in resistance). I pat them all over their bodies every time I go into their stalls or catch them, sometimes 3 and 4 times a day. I think they are on the road to acceptance of their new lives. I’m encouraged

A BRIGHT NEW YEAR!

Jan 2, 2011

            Diana and Karla Axness came by to see the Icys. Diana is a very good photographer and took a lot of pictures of them. Wanda Walker came as well and did some of her Bowen work on each of their heads. I knew that Sam had a crooked jaw, but he wasn’t the only one who had his jaw out. Trick also suffered from that as well. She twicked and tweeted on each one and they were very good. Some horses are worried at first when Wanda does her moves on them, but these guys were pretty mild and mostly curious. They aren’t used to strangers and were kind of timid at first, but they warmed up to Diana and Karla pretty well. Once Wanda was done with them, she sat at the end of the arena to watch them cavort around and soon they were all clustered around her wanting to know her better. I’ve seen this happen many times. Horses don’t lie and if you do something to make them feel better, they want you to do it some more. I expect that when Wanda comes to the barn in the future, they will want her to come talk to them. I’m looking forward to seeing the pictures Diana took. I’ll put some up on the blog when I see them.

Jan 5

            Zane, my horse shoer, came to do horses today and he did what he could with the Icys. Bleu was very good and Zane was able to do all of his feet. There was only one little oops on a back foot, but then he was fine. Sam also was able to have both front and back feet done. The other three were only trimmed on their front feet. They were very good boys. Again, they are not used to very many different people and had to accept Zane, but he is a patient man and his confidence helped them just stand and tolerate the process. I will continue to work with their back feet so he can get them eventually. Bleu had the worst feet and so the rest can wait until they are more willing. I am very careful with my ferrier. A good one is hard to find and I don’t want one of my horses to injure him. Zane liked their short backs and short cannon bones. He thought they were pretty powerful little guys.

Jan 6

            I continue to touch the Icys all over. They are not flinching(well, maybe Trick and Shiloh a little still) when I pat them all over. I’ve been working on picking up their tails. Bleu and Sam don’t seem to care. Bleu even picks it up so I can scratch under his tail. Trick and Treat are letting me swish it more and I can pick it up and they don’t clamp it right down and move away. Shiloh is still the problem child. He at least lets me touch it without tucking it way down now, but if I swish it much he moves away.

            I was watching the horde play. They are so aggressive when they rough house. They stand straight up on their hind legs and bang into each other like rams. They run and chase around the arena in a game of tag that splits off into pairs or a threesome and then all take off again. It’s kind of like a bazaar form of soccer. I watch Trick and Treat move around together like they were a pair. The bays still hang out a lot and so do the chestnuts(Bleu and Shiloh). Sam still moves from one to the other pair at his will. He will also stand off by himself. He is not the underdog, in fact, I don’t think there really is a submissive in the group. Maybe that is why they are always fighting it out.

            I put a few of them at a time out in the round pen the other day. The space is too small for all of them at once, but I put Trick, Treat and Sam out together and then Bleu and Shiloh later in the day. They played just a much there, but they seemed to like being out in the open air. They were very easy to catch. This may be the best way to instill in them the desire to let me catch them. I have to lead them out and in one at a time. Tried to lead both Bleu and Shiloh in together and they Shiloh bolted. Luckily it was inside the arena. They are coming along, but I need to keep in mind that they still have hair triggers.